Egyptian Houses

Comparison Between Egyptian and Viking Houses

Criteria

Egyptian Houses

Viking Houses

Images

Materials

- Sun- dried bricks, made of mud and straw. Although these bricks were inexpensive and enabled fast construction, they were not durable
- To manufacture the bricks, the mixture of mud and straw was placed into
brick moulds, and left out in the sun to dry.
- The wall thickness was about 40 cm, with narrow windows, this helped to keep the house cool by protecting from the outside heat
- wooden sticks and palm rafters made up the ceilings.

- In the Viking homelands there were plenty of trees, so the walls of the houses were built of wood
- Wooden poles at the sides, supported the walls and the roof.
- The preferred type of wood used was oak

Roofs

- Flat roofs, which formed part of the living area, and provided additional storage space

- Roofs were thatched were made of small wooden roof tiles

Size and Rooms

- A single nuclearfamily of 5 to 7 persons lived in the traditional ancient Egyptian house
- The typical house was square in shape and consisted of two rooms, a living area and a back yard which acted as an outside kitchen
- The interior walls contained niches where statues of gods were kept.
- Very few houses had any bathrooms, most people relieved themselves outdoors.

- Most houses consisted of only one large hall
- Somewhere between 30 and 50 people living together in a house, the entire collectivefamily and their slaves- Viking houses are called longhouses, because of their oblong in shape, and their length which reached up to 30
meters long

Kitchen

- External - Back yard kitchens were equipped with a clay stove for baking bread. The basic cooking equipment was a two-handled pottery saucepan.

- Internal - The fireplace was the focal point of the house, which provided not only heat and light but also the means of cooking. It was placed in the center of the house, with a hole in the roof above to allow smoke to get out.

Furniture

- Wood was scarce, Egyptians did not have much furniture.
- The most common item of furniture was a low brick stool.
- Rich people had beds and mattresses, while poorer people slept on a straw mattress or rug on the floor.
- Egyptians did not have cupboards and stored things in reed baskets.
- Food was stored in pottery vessels

- A low wooden bench followed each of the long sides of the house, these were covered with fur or cloth, and used for sleeping.
- There would also be some shelves, a loom ( textile
weaving was an almost full time job for many Viking women ) and perhaps a table and some stools.